Describing 'nothing'
I'm looking for members to point out the flaws in the following statement:
Nothing is the absence of anything, even a definition. Therefore, for a true nothing to exist, every possibility must exist at every time but never any one at any particular time. These circumstances would prevent the nothingness from being defined and it would remain nothing.
If you could quote certain texts/ideas from credible sources in your responses that would be very appreciated.
Thanks and have a nice day!
Nothing is the absence of anything, even a definition. Therefore, for a true nothing to exist, every possibility must exist at every time but never any one at any particular time. These circumstances would prevent the nothingness from being defined and it would remain nothing.
If you could quote certain texts/ideas from credible sources in your responses that would be very appreciated.
Thanks and have a nice day!
Comments (39)
A "nothing" cannot exist. Nothingness has no referrent, because a referrent is something that exists. Nothingness is not a state of affairs- a state of affairs exists (at least hypothetically).
Nothing is the absence of everything. That is the closest you will get to defining it.
Nothing is a concept. Concepts require definition.
Concepts require explications, this is done using words. Words need definitions.
That's an interesting thought that relates to something I've occasionally wondered.
If you think of non-extension in every dimension, non-existence in every possible category, that seems to be as close to a "true" nothing as you can get, although awkwardly, you're still left with the categories and dimensions as possibilities to be "filled out" with existence, or actuality.
So the true true nothing would seem to be not just lack of extension, lack of existence in any particular category or possibility, but also the absence of those very categories or possibilities themselves.
But then it seems like you can't get away from the (so to speak global) possibility of categories and dimensions.
The interesting thing is that this last, final, most etherial form of nothing, is indeterminate, just a kind of raw, unformed sort of possibility (whereas the absent categories and their lack of filling-in were determinate, had shape).
Essentially, it seems like if you chase down nothing as far as possible, you're just left with this kind of unformed possibility. But is that possibility not a something? It seems to be a something, but an indeterminate something.
But maybe that's just what nothing is, the concrete shape of it: nothing is the possibility of something.
I would suggest you are mixing up two alternatives that together give the more complete ontic view.
So nothingness can be defined as the definite and actual lack of anything. A true state of nothingness lacks possibility as all possibilities are what have been removed. It is an emptiness. And it ought to be somehow beyond any particular kind of spatiotemporal container. An empty box still leaves the problem of their being a box.
Now if that is our best image of true nothingness - the absence even of possibility - then what is the opposite of that. It would be a state of everythingness. If every possibility is being freely expressed, all at once, no matter if the possibilities might seem to contradict, then that is also a kind of perfect nullity as nothing in particular has any clear existence. Even spacetime might be regarded as having an infinity of directions rather than just three spatial dimensions bound to a thermal direction of action. So it would be just a mass of fluctuations going off in orthogonal, disconnected, directions with no coherence. A white noise of possibility with no concrete actuality. A vagueness or Apeiron.
So a definition of nothingness doesn't really make sense by itself. We are only really standing in our state of definite somethingness and noting that we can create the kinds of emptiness that are definite existence drained of all further possibility. A container without contents.
Then we can flip that over to imagine an opposite bound to a state of definite somethingness. That now becomes an absolute everythingness that is like a contents without a container. There is every unstable possibility, and yet no stable actuality.
Believe it or not, this is progress. Metaphysical furniture understood in terms of a mutual definition means we at least can be sure that where we are at lies somewhere inbetween the two extremes we have just identified. Metaphysical work can begin.
So on the one hand, our condition of observed somethingness is bounded by a state of "pure empty container". At the other extreme, it is bounded by the opposite condition of a state of "pure unbounded content". We exist measurably between two limit states. And that ought to map to the real world in some fundamental way.
One way it does is to standard Big Bang~Heat Death cosmology. The Big Bang, on many accounts, started in a state of quantum flux - a pre space and time roil of "quantum foam". So pure unbound content.
Then the universe is heading for the opposite of a Heat Death. It will expand and cool to become as empty of energy density as possible. So it will be a container without contents. In some sense, it will be a generalise spatiotemporal container. But now it will have only the minimal quantum sizzle of zero degree radiation. A virtual stuff in fact. Time and space will lose any meaning as expansion will have ended, energetic interactions cease to happen, in any real sense.
So the question is not "what is nothingness?". It is what does our attempt to conceive of nothingness then direct our attention towards. What is its "other" that we might have been missing. Having found the two possible extremes that bound what we understand as the actual somethingness of physical existence, then a larger evolutionary story can slot into place where the Cosmos is the transformation of the one into the other in some useful and measurable sense.
"nothing is the possibility of something."
That's exactly it. That is the most efficient way to explain it. I wanted to have this statement critiqued but I thought it was too vague to extend to specific deductions that I've made if this statement were true.
I agree with you fully about the paradoxical nature of the concept. For most people, it's unfortunately a non-starter. I see it as an unexplored realm and believe that the idea can be reasonably discussed given certain restrictions are put on the statements. I think that in order for metaphysical arguments to be universally true, or at least hold some sort of merit, all indivisible constituents of the statement must also be true. So let's get down to the nitty gritty.
"But is that possibility not a something?"
What is something? Does it require an observer to exist? For example, would you say pi exists? Why or why not?
"So the question is not "what is nothingness?". It is what does our attempt to conceive of nothingness then direct our attention towards. What is its "other" that we might have been missing."
'Nothing' is defined. It is not my intention to try and redefine the concept. I am trying to understand the implications of the definition. I didn't start this discussion solely because I believe it to be interesting.
There's no point on elaborating until the fundamentals are established.
The prominence and influence of religion in Eastern cultures is much higher than that in the West, and I think it would be very beneficial to be raised in a society where spirituality might peak a greater curiosity in the unknown.
Thanks for the info, it's very much appreciated.
I just read up on the basics of Kyoto School, and in particular "Absolute Nothingness", and I cannot thank you enough as this is the most relevant info I think I've ever gotten.
Some highlights:
"The topos of absolute nothingness is the ultimate “within which” all reality takes place."
"Absolute nothingness is infinitely determinable and its determinates form the actual world, but this “self-determination” occurs “without anything that does the determining,” like an agency without an agent."
"It cannot be called “absolute” unless it negates any particular determination of it and simultaneously enfolds them all. It is the universal of universals."
The way I read it is that absolute nothingness is everything and nothing. It exists without needing a creator to create it and is self-sufficient.
Thanks once again!
Glad you like it!
I find the Kyoto School incredibly beautiful but remarkably difficult to understand. If you come up with any interesting thoughts through reading them please come back and start a thread so I can comment! :smile:
Well, weren't you trying to define it as even the absence of a definition? That inclusion of an epistemic criteria already gets you into the problem that "nothingness" thus becomes a point of view. The view from "somethingness".
And I simply say that one ought to go with that. It becomes an issue of what we can say about points of view themselves. You have to work within that framework, not pretend to stand outside it. This means to define nothing, you must define it in opposition to its proper "other". You have to work with the internalist perspective you are given ... as you can't escape it.
Quoting unic0rnio
So, as I was saying...
Perhaps you will agree, but there's nothing (no thing) to describe.
That's what I mentioned in my comment though, it can't be the absence of possibility in general. It's definitely the absence of the specific possibilities represented by the categories (the empty boxes), but that still leaves a generalized possibility.
I don't think you can get away from this: no matter how much you negate, negate the filling of boxes, negate the empty boxes, you're still left with the possibility of boxes, the possibility of dimensions or categories to be filled in, so a kind of raw, unformed, unspecified possibility is the "cash value" of nothing.
Even if there's nothing, nothing, nothing, there's still the possibility of something, in fact one might even say that nothing is the maximal possibility of something, because the whole pandora's box is stuck behind the firewall, IOW "it" could be (is the possibility of being) anything.
Quoting gurugeorge
I am agreeing that pure indeterminate potential - the possibility of anything - is a form of nothingness. But what I am arguing is that nothingness comes in two complementary forms. So confusion arises in trying to collapse the two into the one. There is a higher level of metaphysical insight in seeing how there is a dichotomy at work here.
And it is recognised in Peircean logic.
There would be nothingness understood as absolute generality - that to which the law of the excluded middle does not apply. And then nothingness understood as absolute vagueness - that to which the principle of non-contradiction fails to apply.
So somethingness is the middle ground state where the law of identity does apply. Somethingness is the particular, the definite, the individuated. And hence the PNC and the LEM do apply to somethingness.
But the LEM does not apply to the purely general. The general is empty of difference. It is the nothingness of a sameness. So that is one extreme way to arrive at a state of nothing.
Then the PNC defines the nothing that is the vagueness of the indeterminate. It is neither the case, nor not the case, that something exists - exists even in the sense of a definite possibility.
You have the further dichotomy of the possible and the actual that rather confuses this discussion. I would point out that all definite possibilities are so because there is some definite context that makes that the case. Some general state of constraint must be in place such that a possibility has an actual form. So while a possibility is not yet actual, it could become the case because the circumstances are already actual. It exists, or is an individuated particular, in that sense.
So there are further subtleties at work here. A classical notion of possibility relies on the definiteness of a context. And we know that a quantum approach to possibilities sees that kind of classical counterfactuality breaking down in a “spooky” fashion. QM is about real indeterminacy. Real vagueness.
So to talk about nothingness, we have to get way beyond a classical conceptual framework which talks simply about empty space - gaps that might be filled. That kind of talk is already imagining a world of crisply individuated particulars ... and the counterfactuality which then parasitically becomes their imagined absence.
That classical conception is fine as far as it goes. But to get at the more absolute version, logic itself points to the answer. If individuated definite somethingness is that to which the three laws of thought apply, then what is less than that, or beyond that, is that to which the laws don’t apply. Which is the absolutely vague or the absolutely general.
So yes. The usual opposite to the idea of a metaphysical void is talk of a metaphysical plenum. And this everythingness is both the “other” of nothingness and also as good as a great big nothing itself in lacking any proper differentiation. There is a reason why metaphysics began with the idea of an Apeiron or unbounded potential, a chaos of possibility. A lack of coheherent differentiation makes a good starting point for a creation story.
But talk of possibility - to the degree it is still talk of some actual state of counterfactuality - is still dealing with nothingness at a classically particular level. It encompasses neither the vague nor the general in its attempted conceptualisation.
I still think nothing is just inherently a self-contradicting concept, it is the lack of anything and yet it's clearly something itself, 'it is a lack of anything'. It's individuated as a term precisely because it contrasts with the term something, not because it's completely devoid - i.e. it has a referent - you can picture an absence by envisioning a space devoid of anything.
If you want to understand the word nothing, then simply look at how it's used in ordinary sentences. There is nothing mysterious about the use of the word. Definitions are simply guides, but use tells us much more.
Say nothing.
I did nothing.
There is nothing there.
Your book said nothing.
Nothing's easy.
I have nothing.
I admit nothing.
These along with hundreds of other uses will tell you more about the word than the musing of hundreds of philosophers.
Hah. And how do metaphysicians, logicians, mathematicians and physicists use the word?
But anyway, I would highlight the metaphysics built into your ordinary language examples - the way they rely on a simple classically-imagined counterfactuality ... a world composed of things. Some thing either exists as a propositional fact, or it doesn't.
So nothing is just understood as "not one thing" - its etymological derivation.
Say not one thing.
I did not one thing.
There is not one thing there.
Your book said not one thing.
Not one thing is easy.
I have not one thing.
I admit not one thing.
This is a very restrictive understanding of "nothingness". And to the degree that one lacks the logical resources to challenge its dependence on simple predication - a calculus of particulars - one really can't hope to rise above an ordinary language confusion about what could be usefully said.
I concluded that nothing has no laws of physics, because those laws imply some sort of underlying mechanism that causes the behavior described by those laws. It has no properties, because there is nothing to substantiate, or "hold onto" those properties.
Then I thought about existence in relation to this, and pondered that it might be relative, in spite of my intuitive sense of it being a more absolute concept. I concluded that with nothing, there is nothing to substantiate the existence of a something, or the lack of existence of it. Then existence of a something within this realm of nothing became unclear, and after torturing myself some more, I eventually concluded that anything that could theoretically be described, of which that description contains within itself a mechanism that allows for it to exist with respect to itself, does exist, with respect to itself, but does not exist outside of itself. Then you can take such a description and add to it stuff to allow for the laws of physics, the big bang, etc., and viola, the universe exists. Problem solved.
These concepts have held with me over the years.
So to me it seems like nothing starts looking a lot like what apokrisis described above as the opposite of nothing: absolutely every possible something, except that those various somethings do not exist with respect to each other.
Take the idea of nothing which every schoolboy understands - the empty space inside a box - and attempt to perfect it and we bump into all sorts of obstacles and pitfalls.
Keep it simple and the empty box will suffice. Attempt to dig any deeper and you get lost.
I tried thinking about nothing and it was pointless because, as you know, nothing has no properties by definition. And, you know this too, our understanding is critically dependent on what properties an object of thought has.
Trying to understand nothing, therefore, is like trying to see a color on a black and white TV. Impossible.
That said, I believe there's always a way to get around roadblocks. It requires ingenuity which I'm sorry to say I don't have.
Have you tried mathematics? Zero?
You look in an empty cup, someone asks you whats in there and you say 'nothing'. Thats how the word "nothing"its usually used- just to indicate to someone else that something does not appear that might have be there.
I like the quote nonetheless.
OK.
"[i]The Dao that can be trodden
is not the enduring and unchanging Dao.
[b]The name that can be named
is not the enduring and unchanging name.[/b][/i]"
-"Daodejing", Legge translation, ch. 1.
Nothing, being nothing can have no opposite.
Could we say that these two statements are the same?
"Nothing is the absence of anything."
"Nothing is the absence of everything."
And if not, what is the distinction?
Anything states one thing, therefore the statement implies that there are or might be others.
With everything there is no room to doubt.
I suspect if you get down to it nothingness I probably a contradictory concept.
Therefore it is more realistic to look at "nothing(-ness)" in terms of the specific context and attribute it is used for. For instance:
Mum: "The porselain is broken. What did you do, Jacob?" Jacob: "I did nothing, Mum!"
Clearly, this neeeds a little editing before feeding it to the household robot to decide upon proper punishment for Jacob. like: Mum: "During the time I was shopping this afternoon, the porselain in the kitchen was broken. Did you do do anything which caused that porselain to be broken, Jacob?" Jacob: "I did zero things to cause the broken state of the kitchen porselain this afternoon, Mum!".
This example shows that "nothing" is often convertible to "zero" when using a different phrasing. One might try to debate the usefulness of the concept of "nothingness" but no one will deny the perks of having the "zero". Lacking it kept Roman calculus backward for centuries.
Math makes perfect use of nothingness by means of the "empty set" - a set which contains nothing - for the construction of number-objects in ZFC Set-Theory, probably the most important theory in all of mathematics. All sets based on natural numbers are derived from the empty set. It tells us that "nothing" in itself may not be much but "nothing in a container" can be a great tool. Another example is the assocation of "nothing" with "non-separation" in number theory. What's between 5 and 10? Well, 6 and 7 and ... But what is between 5 and 6? Pecisely, nothing! Tells you these natural numbers are contiguous, a non-existent property for most other number types.
Similarly, zero is not the same thing as nothingness. As a first issue, zero has properties while nothingness is standardly thought of as falling outside of the possibility of having properties. What you are describing sounds like emptiness, not nothingness. Also, you initially confused "nothing" as in the quantifier with "nothing" as in the noun phrase "nothingness". "Every" and "no" words can be nouns, they're not just quantifiers.
Note that I was aware that zero is not the same as nothing or nothingness. I tried to show that many sentences with the word "nothing" can be easily converted to similar sentences with the word "zero" with the same meaning. That the sentence as a whole has the same meaning does not imply that "zero" and "nothing" have the same meaning but it could imply that the understanding of one can be derived - via a detour - from the understanding of the other.
My view on the emptyness is that - because it refers to an entity which must be empty - it is equivalent to a container with a nothingness (property). For its lack of property the nothingness itself cannot be tied to the container, but there exists no reason why the container would have no information on its emptyness.
I see your points about nouns and quantifiers.
I suspect if you get down to it nothingness I probably a contradictory concept.
This is true if nothingness and everythingness always apply to unrestricted object and property categories/domains. However, in practical cases a property filter is applied before nothingness is declared, e.g.:
A physical object commonly has a color but occasionally not because it is transparent. Its color then is described as "no-color" or "nothing". Its color attribute becomes a nothingness, another way of stating that this particular object has no color attribute. The color-domain restriction assures that the other mereological attributes - especially the objectness of the object - need not be erased.
Is this a valid mereological argument?
But notice we don't always use them this way. So take this:
"When you die, every experience ceases."
This quantifier is unbounded, I'm clearly not limiting it's scope to only a subset of experiences. So we do not always use the quantifier "every" and "no" words within a bound. However, you may be making a potential mistake. "Nothing" and "everything" are not always quantifiers, they can be nouns such as with:
"I was in the middle of everything."
I'm certainly not saying that "For all x, I was in the middle of x" because, obviously, I can't be in the middle of every individual thing in that hypothetical scenario. Rather, I'm taking all the objects there as a whole and saying I was in the middle of that. This can be done with "no" words too:
"God created the world out of nothing."
This definitely wouldn't be translated as "For no x, God created it out of x" because that would be true if God didn't create anything at all. People who believe that intend it to mean something like "There was nothing at all and then *bam* God created it without prior stuff." I wouldn't say that transparent things have a color of "nothingness", they just have no color (nothingness is the absence of anything at all).
So far it seems to me that defining the "nothing" and "everything" quantifiers in a meaningful manner is considerable easier than performing that feat for "nothingness". Of course, we can generate the standard expansion for "-nesses" and define nothingness as "the quality of being nothing" but that is where trouble begins. One needs something to have that quality and a something which is nothing appears a trivial contradiction (as MindForged suggested). Unless of course, the something is a nothing itself - as a thing (noun). A nothing possesses the quality of being nothing and therefore possesses nothingness. That's not a genuine property but a description of the fixed relationship.of these concepts.
The point I try to make here is that, in order to access nothingness without contradiction one needs a nothing, not as a quantifier but as an object. I am not sure meaningful examples of a nothing object exist but if they do, and they are not unbounded, they also provide a peek at bounded mental manifestations of nothingness. Wonder what that looks like.
Not that any of this promises individual significance for the nothingnesses. They are only addressable through nothing objects and that is probably where the buck stops wih regard to any functional uses.